Wednesday, January 4, 2006

AROUND THE WEB ON 1-5-06

Cross-posted from Gus Van Horn

I've gotten back on track enough to resume posting my midweek roundups again. I will probably revert to Wednesday next week.

The Geezer on Gun-Grabbers

Bothenook points out an interesting point made by a San Francisco-area columnist about a law there (which is being challenged in court) to make gun owners turn in their weapons without compensation. He quotes from the article.

San Francisco is supposed to stand for choice. This is supposed to be a town where tolerant individuals don't pass laws that, in essence, say: If I don't do it, you shouldn't either; if you do, you go to jail. Yet the gun ban ends choice -- for the law-abiding, at least.

Interesting double standard. And speaking of double standards, ...

The "Intelligent Design" of the Left

Over at TCS Daily is an article that notes the astonishing similarity between Intelligent Design and socialism.

People on the political left, while characterizing conservatives as being flat-earthers, do believe in a form of Intelligent Design. For like their conservative counterparts who believe that nothing as complex as nature could possibly have emerged without being designed, Beltway bureaucrats and DNC Keynesians believe nothing as complex as an economy can exist without being shaped in their image.

The main problem with the article is that it fails to speak of the 800-pound gorilla in the room. Namely, that many conservatives are "flat-earthers". This would especially include the Creationists. In merely playing "gotcha" with the left, the article thus does both capitalism and evolution a disservice: The problem isn't just that "ID should be protected from 'hegemonic control by those in power'". The big problem is that in academia, the notion of objective truth accessible to reason is under contstant attack from both the left and the right, and that these attacks come disguised as blows for "diversity" or freedom of speech.

And speaking of "delicious ironies", the article's allegedly pro-capitalist author merely alludes to the root of this "hegemonic control" that afflicts academia, public control of the educational sector, while not even broaching the subject of privatization!

What? Is the author afraid he might offend religious conservatives who might want to use public schools as a means of making sure most kids say their prayers?

More on Iran

Martin Lindeskog is on the ball with another roundup on Iran. Here, he quotes Robert Tracinski of TIA Daily.

I have said that Iran's nuclear weapons program will be the top issue of 2006. Well, the clock starts ticking as of now: Iran has announced resumption of its "research" program, which the New York Times correctly notes, is a euphemism for Uranium enrichment to develop a bomb.

But the big revelation comes, ironically, by way of the far left British newspaper The Guardian, which summarizes intelligence reports showing that Iran is working to build a nuclear missile capability that can strike at Israel and even, in the not-too-distant future, at Europe.

If we're going to stop the Iranians, we need to act soon. What are we prepared to do?

In the same issue, Tracinski pointed out a Washington Timeseditorial that discusses Israel's possibly taking out Iran's nuclear facilities, and asks the obvious question: "[W]hy don't we just do it ourselves?" And the matter of Ariel Sharon's health should underscore that point.

Definitely a book worth reading, although I took mild exception to his bizarre ideas that integrity is genetic(?) and God helps people run businesses. While belief in God might have psychological benefits [But at what cost? --ed], I really doubt that the Lord made Chick-fil-a more successful because it observes the Sabbath.

This movie may be of interest to those who are concerned about immigration law and protecting our own freedoms. The films flaws are minor compared to what any thinking person can gain from watching it.

Google, Anyone?

I enjoyed the discussion that occurred at the end of this post. And oh yeah. Those rumors of Google computers for 200 smackers were just that.